Market Value vs. Maker Value
So what’s the difference between 1 USD and 1 Steem? Should we really even compare the two? Both are “currencies” but there are big differences between fiat currency and crypto currency. Steem is a currency rooted in decentralized applications (DApps) that reward online engagement. It’s complex stuff! Steem represents a new kind of value ecosystem that transcends way beyond the ink and paper of our old friend George Washington.
Still, with pretty much everything - we are hard-wired to compare through the lens of market value. We look to see what 1 Steem is worth in USD, an old school currency that - arguably - has very little to do with it. This hardwiring is a really tough habit to put into perspective. For cryptocurrency newcomers, it’s practically impossible to think about Steem in terms of Maker Value and not just in terms of Market Value. To give you a sense of this hard-wiring, let’s look at a phrase that our team hears all the time, it goes something like this:
“This post took 3 hours and I only earned 10 USD worth of Steem. It’s just not worth it.”
That’s a very common reaction. (It was certainly ours early on.) In fact, this was probably everyone’s first gut reaction with respect to blogging on Steemit. Newcomers look for familiar precedents to draw comparisons from. They compare what they know best. Primarily, crypto-newbies look at their existing jobs and hourly wages. However, once you begin to peel back the layers of this blockchain onion there’s much, much more to consider.
1 US Dollar is very different than 1 Steem
Beyond the market swings and investment potential, Steem carries an incredible amount of utility right here and now. This unique functionality makes it far more dimensional as a resource than the 2D paper money we're so familiar with. Let's take a look at some of the biggest differences, below.
| $1.00 USD | What can a “Maker” can do with one dollar? |
|---|
- Well, it’s not exactly secure (you can easily lose it, have it stolen or copied)
- It’s certainly not agile (it’s tough and costly to send from A to B)
- It loses value over time (through both physical damage and depreciation)
| 1.00 STEEM | What can a "Maker" do with one Steem? |
|---|
- A “Maker” can own it directly (it’s not debt, it’s theirs and theirs alone)
- It’s agile (takes 3 seconds to send anywhere across the globe)
- It’s resilient (when staked as Steem Power, it earns interest)
- You can utilize your ownership of it to wield influence within the whole Steem economy!
- You can help other Makers (like you) earn Steem
- You can vote on witnesses (or stewards) of the blockchain who are tasked with making critical decisions on infrastructure
- You can even lend (delegate) your stake in Steem to others (all the while you maintain full ownership of that stake)
One Steem has so much more functionality and stewardship to offer than a paper dollar. All of this added ability makes it almost impossible to look at the traditional or “Market Value” of the two side by side.
Cultivating Awareness and Crypto-Empathy
Through workshops, exhibitions, our publication and incubator - we're advocates of crypto-empathy. It will take a good deal of patience and awareness to re-wire our perceptions of currencies, and what they should inherently provide for us. Steem is an incredible example of this re-wiring in action. A whole community is learning about Steem organically online, right now. This new social network and economic landscape is taking shape. The primordial soup of Steem is evolving right before our eyes and we - the whole community here - get to help shape it.
For the newcomers who have stumbled upon this article, consider reading a bit further! Here are a handful of posts that dig into the functionality of Steem:
| Blog Post Description | |
|---|---|
 | Welcome to Steemit! - A welcome post for newcomers to Steemit and creatives interested in the world of cryptocurrency. |
 | The Benefits of Powering Up - A comprehensive guide to powering up. |
 | What is a Steemit Witness? - The roles and responsibilities of a witness explained. |
 | How an Upvote Works - Where the money and the rewards come from. |
Want to support Steemit content like this? Consider joining our curation trail! You can learn more about the @sndbox incubator mission here and our 2018 program schedule, here.
The difference between one Steem and one USD is currently 2.36 USD. 😂 JK
Thanks for this great post as you do point out some great differences. There is a lot of utility with Steem. That is a big reason I joined this platform and powered up.
Volatility is a big difference between Steem and USD. Steem's value has doubled in the last few weeks, and has gone up as much as 100x in less than a year. This kind of volatility doesn't exist for the USD.
This comparison was great but I think a better comparison would be BTC vs Steem.
Both can be owned directly, but that's almost where the similarities stop.
BTC is agile, but certainly not as agile as Steem since Steem's transactions are much faster.
BTC is unable to earn interest for the owner or anyone else.
BTC does not give you any voting rights.
BTC does not allow you to lend it to another party, while still allowing you to maintain control.
Essentially BTC and Steem are the same, but Steem has the added bonus of utility. I invested this platform because I enjoy using my Steem Power more than just merely HODLing BTC.
Thanks so much for your feedback on this @themightyvolcano. Absolutely, it would be good to do a side-by-side with - perhaps - several cryptocurrencies to see the big picture / strength of Steem. People are still wrapping their heads around BTC, it might take some time for them to venture down the crypto-rabbit-hole. Thanks again :D
In my point of view, Steem is still volatile as if I want to spend it to acquire some physical asset (which most of the time I need to convert to fiat), it may not be constatn in value. Meaning to say, I cannot do a real costing budget whereby I know how much Steem I need to acquire some goods and services I want.
Nonetheless, Steem has better agility when it comes to reinvest and earn the compounding interest. Yet, in terms of fiat, we do have many investment tools like unit trust, bonds, shares, CD and so on.
Anyway, I also learn a lot about finance through Steem :)
I agree with you. Its helpful for me to withdraw the same amount of USD each week, for example $100, regardless of how much steem it is. When Steem goes up, I withdraw less steems, when its down I withdraw a little more, but my income can be steady. Its the only way I've found to manage Steem as part of my short-term income.
Yup, that would probably work. Balancing the amount in relative to certain fiat. A ratio set for crypto to stand in the asset portfolio. I still have no idea where to cap it 😂 to me it is like the more the better.
I love posts like this.
Explains a lot of basic information, as well as outline approaches for the beginner and the intermediate to find a workable system. Steemit is a completely different website, more so than in the past, an entire ly new world in comparision. Together, Steemians will witness the pronounciation of the Prosumer, the emergence of a new character identity to exist in the societial fabric. A virtual marketplace, where ideas and thoughts can be exchanged for their inherent value, for their atteuated knowledge, linking experience with engagement and elevating individuals in a novel exchange of voluntarism.
I'm an artist-entreprenuer finding an incredible wealth of new potential networking with great, quite interesting people from all over the world. Without bounds and without borders, Steemit is like a free land of new opportunity for the weary consumer now turned a part-time info-tainment sharecropper, gleaning what last grainules of personal identity and occupying of of countless shimmering anonymous blinking nodes in the Big Data ocean.
Thank you @sndbox for sharing this!
$upvote https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@ari.afliandi/hello-steemians-here-s-my-introduction-post-3355735829a71
FIAT $$$ is legacy Crypto is the future!
Now the question is shell I putt all my FIAT into crypto?
Upvoted and resteemed
I am at steemit for almost a year now. Initially it was tough to digest steem SBD stuff. you explained it better
Mehn this is so expository and from all you have written, one can see that the importance if steem outweighs that of Fiat which we have failed to let go. This is also an eye opener and I am happy to have read it this early morning.
Great job on the subject. A must read for both old and new. Thank you.
A well detailed and educative post regarding the differences between steem and usd, no doubt steem has greater value and does not wear and tear over time, steem is a currency but cannot been seen, felt or touched. So the possibility for steem to be stolen is very slim.
Thanks @sndbox for this wonderful post regarding differences between steem and USD, but I think the only point where USD stands out is the fact that it has a standard value, steem does not because it goes up and down and has no standard of fixed value. This post is sure very educative and it's a must read for every steemian.
@blinks
The difference is clear, some months back around January, sure enough no one will ever compare the worth of one steem and a dollar. That’s an insult lmao. And in the recent view of things, steem is boasting and assuring us of buying a 100USD with one unit
1steem -100USD. And that’s what we all waiting for . Thanks for bringing the discussion into limelight
This is so funny right ... lol
So far this is the best post I've seen. Since i am a beginner in this platform, it really gives me a lot of idea regarding the differences of USD and STEEM. When I first clicked this website, i really dont have an idea what are those, and now i am starting to learn, and hoping to grow soon. Thanks buddy
Great article, thanks for sharing. I've smashed the upvote button for you!
Also, if you are looking to get some tokens without investing or mining check out Crowdholding (https://www.crowdholding.com). They are a co-creation platform were you get rewarded for giving feedback to crypto startups on the platform. You can earn Crowdholding's token as well as DeepOnion, ITT, Smartcash and many other ERC-20 tokens.
Now I know
I love this...... Thanks for the message
Beautiful! Sharing insight and that aspect of empathy we call love.
Muchas gracias - that's now living a fruitful life!
Thanks for this eye opener
thanks your post!
Thanks for bringing more light on this,because m a beginner on this great platform.
A good and necessary explanation.
Confused me for a long time when I started here.
cool, I think this is good information for me that is new to play, very interesting talking about Steem, good work @sndbox and @creativecrypto, you are one of the best, once again thanks for the information
They think they waste their time in Steemit because they do not generate money like @jerrybanfield, @v4vapid, etc ... because their publications do not reach $ 10 and tend to leave the platform, this type of nonconformist think they will get rich overnight, earning $ 10 per publication is a privilege that many do not have in my country venezuela earn that amount is 4 times more than the minimum, of any worker's salary.
What can a "Creator" do with a Steem?
Steem .. !! opens a world of possibilities as you just mentioned... the local currency is devalued and you pay the "steem" tax is the opposite, steem gains value and do not pay tax you are free to do what you want with 1 steem, very soon the world cryptographic will dominate the monetary world and real money will be obsolete and everything will move by means of blockchain transactions.
I don't think we can or should compare the two. I think this is and will be a big challenge in the coming years. We need to reach mass adoption in order to really change how we interact with money and sometimes we just need to start from scratch rather than trying to compare it with what we already know. Cryptocurrencies are a revolution, a new economy, and break all the pre-conceived ideas we have...about everything. The concept of a shared economy is why I started in crypto. I mean why would I pay a middle men for value I provide? I really think steemit is in the right direction (they just need to control all the spammy bots...)
This has really helped me as a newbie to both Steemit and the crypto world. I've had the added confusion of "converting" back into our South African rand. Thanks for giving a little clarity
Thank you for the info, @sndbox. Honestly, I am not really so familiar yet as to the functions of this and that in Steemit, why one post get so much upvotes and $$$ while the other one with a better post (in my opinion) gets lesser upvotes and $$$. Well I try my best not to be frutrated but just come up with a better post everytime and just hope that it gets noticed, upvoted and resteemed. I know that there is so much to learn in this platform and yes, I will eventually get to them. God bless.